21-Apr-2004
Title: Tetractys
Author: Sol, but archived as Zefyr on FF & MM
Chapter 15 "Netzach, III" --- ONGOING
Genre: Semi-AU, AU-in-AU, Drama, Sci Fi
Pairings: Wait and see.
Rated: R for the time being
Archived: fanfiction.net and gwaddiction.com
Warnings: Violence, language, adult situations, butchered scientific
theory
Archiving: Ask permission for each story separately, please.
Critiques: Always welcome, especially constructive.
"You realize it took us most of the night and half the day to travel a distance we could've covered by car in about eight hours?" Duo collapsed onto the bed, and stared at the ceiling while Trowa scoped the room. Duo waited for a minute, then sat up, groaning. "It *still* feels like everything's moving."
"I'd tell you to sleep but that's all you've really done for the past eighteen hours," Trowa replied. "Sleep now, and you'll be up all night." He sat on the bed opposite Duo, and buried his face in his hands. His words were a little muffled, but clear through the 'com. "We're clear. They didn't have enough time to plan, and they don't suspect us, anyway. From what I could tell, the scientists and government officials will be at the hotel by dinnertime...I think we'll do our song-and-dance, then."
Duo leaned back on his hands. "You going to keep up with that sugar intake? Surprised you're not bouncing off the walls." His smile looked forced, as though he were trying to change the subject.
"People have strange ways of measuring other people," Trowa said, and laid down on his side, staring at Duo. "Arrowsmith honestly believes a backwater mechanic would take advantage of real sugar and real cream at any opportunity."
"I think he's never met a real mechanic before," Duo replied, also lying down. Several feet separated the two beds in the small Danish hotel room. It wasn't too far away for Trowa to miss the strange look flashing over Duo's face before the other man shrugged, with one shoulder, and smirked. "The average mechanic I've known always wants his - or her - coffee black. And strong. None of this pansy milk-and-sugar stuff."
"You forget... what was his name?"
"The bonehead," Duo replied, nodding. "Jake... Jack?... the idiot in... "
"Acquisitions. Jack."
"Yeah, him. Drank condensed milk with his coffee. Stuff was thicker than dirty axle grease, man... " Duo rolled over to stare at the ceiling, and Trowa noticed Duo's fingers were plucking nervously at the quilt under him. Duo toed off his boots, and let his legs fall straight out, slightly splayed. His mouth never stopped moving. "Jack. Yeah, Jack. Thought Haley was gonna clock him that time Jack tried to make him drink the stuff. Said it was Asian, but even Fei wouldn't have anything to do with it and do you ever wonder what's going on back home right now?"
The question startled Trowa, and he had to review Duo's words to catch up. "I... I would expect they're on the verge of economic and political collapse," he finally said.
"Maybe." Duo chuckled, a cold sound. "I can hope, right... "
"Doesn't matter to me. I don't plan on going back."
"Right."
The room was silent for several minutes, and Trowa frowned. Duo's fingers had never stopped their nervous movement, smoothing the quilt by his hips, then plucking at it, twitching, then smoothing. Trowa propped his head up on his fist. "Okay, spill. What's going on?"
"Oh... " Duo started to smile, but the look faded quickly. "We're... " He winced, and closed his eyes. "Tro... I don't think we're going to make it," he whispered.
Trowa was off the bed in an instant, and kneeling next to Duo's bed. He didn't touch Duo, but leaned into him, offering support without invoking the buffer. "What do you see?"
"Before it was fifty-fifty." Duo's voice faded, and he only moved his mouth, the move habitual despite Trowa's certainty the room was clean. "But just now... walking down the hallway, everything changed. They're going to pick our brains, and then tomorrow all these men we've seen today... we're going to be quietly executed sometime around mid-morning." Duo's voice was ragged, and his brows were furrowed. His hands fisted in the quilt. "I don't... I don't know. Every now and then I get a flash, that things will work out, but it's instinct, it's something random... and I can't see what'll make the difference."
"Then we wait, and I keep listening and you keep watching---"
"What if Heero's not coming after all? What if the rest of them aren't going to, either, because they think we're---"
"No," Trowa said, firmly, exaggerating mouthing the words, to emphasize the message. "They'd go through with it, anyway. They've planned for too long---"
"I don't want to die," Duo said, quietly. He frowned, and turned his head away from Trowa, and whispered, "I still... there are things I wanna do, y'know?"
Trowa sat back on his heels. He couldn't argue with Duo's sight; it had been proven right as many times as his hearing. But he could at least listen, he reminded himself, and asked his question out loud. "Like what? What sort of things?" He knew most of them, sure, but Trowa also knew there was a difference between idle dreams while tipsy over cards, and the rearrangement of priorities when staring death in the face.
"All sorts of things... " Duo shrugged, still staring at the wall. "Like... I wanna fall in love, too." He chuckled, bitterly. "I'd settle for having sex. Just once."
"It's not that big a deal," Trowa started to say, but Duo cut him off.
"Oh, yeah, says the man who's already done it!" Duo sat up, pulling his braid around to his chest and glaring at it. He threw the braid over his shoulder and flopped on his side, facing away from Trowa, his shoulders stiff. "And I bet by the time... by the time... I bet when we get back, Heero will have done it, *too*."
"Maybe." Trowa sighed, and turned around to lean his back against the bed. "Duo... it really isn't that great. It's... it's cool, but it's not... "
"Earth-shattering?" The tone was sarcastic.
"No. It's not." Trowa shrugged. "And if this is it, for us, sex or no sex won't be what I regret---"
"Like I said, you've been there, done that, wrote the book, saw the movie, lost everything in the lawsuit---"
"Duo," Trowa snapped, but softly.
"Yeah. Whatever. Go away." Duo pulled the pillow over his head and curled up in a ball.
Trowa sighed, and stood up. "I'm going to find out if we can get some more towels. You'll probably use all of ours just for your hair."
Duo didn't say anything, and Trowa hesitated. After a minute or two, when Duo still hadn't responded, Trowa left on his errand.
"Blue group will be here," the man said, leaning over the map and stabbing at a point just north of the Administrative Palace. "Clothos will be running the command center, which is stationed in the apartment over this café, here." He pointed to a circled spot, two blocks away. "I spoke with 04 this---"
"Which 04?" Heero raised his head from the plans.
"Uh... " The man glanced at the three women circling the table, bewilderment on his face. He was the head of the resistance for Northern Europe, and he'd been working almost around the clock for the previous two weeks, getting their forces in place to back the pilots. The enforced radio silence, though, meant he was catching up on the new pilots' inclusion. He'd reacted as though Heero's introduction were a joke, but met with the Fates' stony faces, he'd swallowed his laughter and offered a hand. Heero had ignored it, and the tension had yet to disperse.
The redheaded woman by the window turned. "There are two 04s, Sven. Doro is still the leader, but... let's just say we found ourselves another Quatre Winner."
"Sure, Sally, like you found another Heero Yuy," Sven said, casting ice blue eyes on Heero.
Heero glared, not enjoying the man's derisive snort.
"Sven, who's piloting isn't important," Une interrupted. "Just give us the details on where your people will be."
"Yes, ma'am," Sven replied. His finger circled the area around the Palace, the light glinting off his signet ring. Heero noticed for the first time that the ring's design was a yellow rose. "I've managed to cover the city with a good number of our people. They'll be stationed at all shops and offices within a three-block radius, to keep civilians back. Those are their orders. They know not to get involved, or get in the way."
Heero nodded, studying the map. "04 and the two 05s will come from this direction, but I'm not clear on how---"
"Chickens, Yuy," Sally said, flipping one of her braids over her shoulder. She smiled, and one eyebrow arched. "I heard you're already acquainted with the process."
"Yeah." Heero's lips twisted in a wry grin, and he bent to study the approach and getaway procedures.
Meiran didn't bother knocking, but Quatre and Wufei had heard her in the hallway, telling Zhiyi to get lost for a little bit. Wufei was sitting by the window, having said nothing since he'd returned to the room after lunch. Quatre was sitting at the desk, his head down, and his shoulders hunched. He hadn't moved much since they'd checked in, nor had he gone to lunch, but Wufei hadn't pushed the issue, either, to Quatre's relief. Quatre just wanted to get through the next two days, and then... He wasn't really sure what he wanted to do, after that. Not for the first time he wished Duo were around to give him a better estimate of the risks.
"You two," Meiran said, and closing the door behind her. She sounded exasperated.
She moved first to Wufei, kissing him on the cheek. Quatre caught the move in the mirror, and frowned a little, uncertain. He'd gotten the sense from Meiran that she was at ease with Wufei, but Quatre had been too caught up in his own turbulent self-hatred to give a damn about the particulars. He sighed and dropped his head again, staring at his hands, and was startled to feel cool arms slipping around his shoulders, hugging him from behind.
"Quatre," Meiran whispered into his ear. "Turn around and look at me. I have news."
"I'm fine like this," Quatre said, his throat tight. He felt sore from yelling, though it had been twenty-four hours. It was as though something inside him was still hollering, pounding at his ribs, demanding that he either wake up, or go to sleep for good.
"No, turn around," Meiran coaxed.
"You're as bad as Wufei," Quatre grumbled, but obediently pushed the chair away from the desk, turning it to face the little bedroom, with its inane floral pattern on the queen-sized bed, the hook rug by the fake fireplace... he shut his eyes, and flinched when Meiran's hands were placed on his cheeks. "What," he growled, too tired to put much force into it.
"Why am I as bad as Wufei?" Her voice sounded teasing, and Quatre opened his eyes to see her lips twisting into a half-smile.
"Because somehow you've managed to do the same as he, and be the only other person I can't tell no," Quatre confessed, a bit wryly. He sighed, and leaned forward, somehow unsurprised when she came up on her knees to press her forehead against his in a quick, comforting touch. Her emotions didn't overwhelm him, but he could feel a bubbling happiness lurking under the steady flow of affection. "What," he repeated, and couldn't say the rest.
"Wufei," Meiran turned, looking over her shoulder, and patted the bed next to the desk. There was a pause, followed by Wufei's soft footsteps and the creak of the bedsprings. Meiran sat back on her heels, one hand still resting on Quatre's knee. "Duo's here in the city, and Trowa's with him. They're both alive, and fine."
Quatre nodded, then blinked as her words sank in. The room spun, and everything went dangerously black at the corners of his vision. He had to cough, gasping, trying to get air into lungs squeezed too tight. He managed to force his eyes open to see Meiran's blurry form. She was saying something, and he shook his head.
"Alive," he choked out. There was another pair of hands on his shoulder, and he recognized the touch as Wufei's. Meiran's hands were on his knees, and Quatre was being guided to lean forward, his head between his knees. "I'm not... I'm not... going to... " He protested, and took another deep breath, groaning as the room tilted on his axis. He took another shuddering breath, and tightened his grip on Wufei and Meiran. "Alive... oh my god in---"
"Quatre, slow down," Wufei said, his voice calm. "You will make yourself pass---"
"Wufei, hush," Meiran interrupted. "Both of you. It's safe now. They're both alive. Doro didn't know the details but she'll be in contact, so... " She settled back on her heels, and slowly pulled her hands away from Quatre. "You... I'll leave you two, now." She started to stand.
Quatre wasn't sure what pushed him to move. His vision was moving in and out, his heart in his throat and he thought he was going to vomit or choke or perhaps both and damn if he didn't care. Trowa was *alive*, and there was still a chance, still a remote chance that he could someday make it up, do enough to be forgiven... and Meiran's touch was as calm and gently joyous as Wufei's was relieved and protective. Quatre reached out, grabbing Meiran's hand, and tugging her back.
"Don't go," he managed to say, and pulled her back, between the two of them. "Don't... just... " Ignoring Meiran's startled squeak, he pushed her half onto Wufei's lap, and fell out of the chair to kneel at their feet. Blindly he wrapped his arms around both of them, his head on her thigh, his face turned to press against Wufei's leg. "Please... if he's alive... " The tears came fast and hot, and he let them fall, not sobbing, just *feeling* the relief and hope and anger and hatred and frustration and joy and regret---
Distantly he was aware that both of them were leaning over him, sheltering him, holding him upright as his body sagged. He held on as long as he could, not caring if his body was shaking and he was sniffling against Wufei's lap, not really noticing that four hands were running across his back and his arms and through his hair, and hearing their reassuring whispers as from a distance.
" ...Forgive me," he tried to say. "What if Trowa never for---"
"Forgive *me*," Meiran murmured, a hitch in her voice. Quatre lifted his head, blinking past the tears to see her face, lines around her eyes from care and exhaustion, but she met his gaze steadily. "I should have---"
"No," Quatre whispered, his fingers curling, digging into Wufei's and Meiran's hips. "I thought I had it figured out, that I could---"
"No one and everyone is to blame," Wufei said, and leaned down to kiss Quatre on the forehead. "We love you. That won't stop."
Quatre was silent for a long time, his gaze darting from Wufei's troubled but longing expression, to the sorrow and relief warring on Meiran's face. Too tired to fight back, and too overwhelmed by the emotion and care pouring from both of them, he could only lower his head back onto their laps, and let the tears flow.
"That was the biggest waste of time," Duo muttered under his breath, rubbing his forehead as they entered the little hotel room.
Trowa closed the door behind them, locking it as he listened to the guard walk away. There were a number of military people of various ranks billeted in the small hotel, and Trowa had been surprised to find that the guard didn't know much about them, and didn't care. As far as most of the military people were concerned, Duo and he were two mechanics doing their part for the Foundation and a bit of cash. At most, they were patriotic if nameless heroes; at worst, they were mercenaries who served the Foundation, so it didn't matter anyway. Trowa leaned against the door, watching Duo undo his braid and redo it, a nervous action Trowa hadn't seen in years.
"Duo," Trowa whispered, coming to stand behind his partner. Gently he took the hair from Duo's hands, and braided it quickly and neatly, tying it off. Duo didn't move for several seconds, then pulled his braid around and undid the tie. Trowa sighed, and let Duo undo and redo as he pleased.
The meeting had been a low-key affair, for the most part. Nine or ten military officials, seated around a table, with Trowa and Duo in the center, fielding questions. Well, Trowa thought, not entirely. It would be more accurate to say that Duo flinched every time someone spoke - an oddity for the normally gregarious member of their team - while Trowa listened to the person's expectations and couched his answer in such a way to satisfy the question without contradicting any previous statements. The whole thing had given him a headache of the first degree, but Duo's behavior worried him more. Trowa leaned against the dresser, the room's only other furniture other than the two beds and the little table, and watching Duo drop the braid and start pacing.
"No change," he said, guessing.
"None," Duo retorted. "It's... everywhere. Every voice, every person... " He paused by the window, twitching the curtain to look out before letting it fall again. "I... I feel trapped, Tro. I gotta get out of here. I don't wanna---"
"Duo," Trowa said, covering the small room in three paces to hug Duo from behind. "We will get out of this. You just have to believe it, and that single instant will happen that will change everything."
"Sure." The response was singularly less than convinced.
"I am sure." Trowa put as much conviction into his words that he could muster, and turned Duo around. Their heights were only a few inches different, and Trowa put a finger under Duo's chin, tipping his face just a few degrees upwards. "I *am* sure," he repeated.
"I can't be," Duo replied miserably, his eyes lowered. His hands were clenched in fists at his sides. "I can see," he hissed. "Maybe you can't, but I can, and I---"
"You are the one who always tells us that nothing is set in stone, and that you can't see everything," Trowa pointed out, reasonably. "And don't forget that I'm a... how did you put it? A black hole."
Duo snorted.
"We don't go through our days making no ripples in the water, Duo," Trowa said, so quietly it was barely more than a breath. "I can hear people's thoughts shifting around me with every word I speak. I see the effects of my actions."
"The effects of my actions are already present in what I see," Duo retorted.
"Bullshit." Trowa pursed his lips, running through the things Duo had said, the little gestures, noting the lines around Duo's eyes from years of squinting at threads and tracing patterns in the air that only Duo could see. Trowa thought of Heero's words, and the pain in Duo's eyes while relaying the message. Trowa thought of the last time he'd seen Heero, and the smile on Lena's face when she'd looked up to see Heero standing there, as though Trowa hadn't been there, hadn't been noticed except as an afterthought. It was then that he knew what he needed to say, to do, to make the difference, to get Duo to see the empty space where that momentary instinct would occur that might change everything. Trowa smiled, and stepped closer. "I think," he whispered, "you just need incentive."
"Incentive?" Duo's gaze jumped up to meet Trowa's, that deep blue shading into purple in the early evening light. His body was thrumming under Trowa's finger; a muscle flickered in Duo's jaw.
"To believe that we can change the future," Trowa replied. "Just... something to look forward to."
Duo's brow furrowed. "Like what?"
In answer, Trowa leaned down and kissed Duo. It felt odd, at first, to break the agreement they'd made, so many years ago. To kiss lips that had spat at him, yelled at him, laughed at him and with him, exhorted him through bad missions and teased him through good. To feel the warmth, the trembling, the hesitation of a man who acted with uncanny instinct and foreknowledge at all times, rarely startled and even more rarely at a loss. Trowa could feel the quick rush of air on his lips as Duo gasped, and he opened his own mouth, just enough to run his tongue along the line of Duo's lips. Someone whimpered, and Trowa smiled to himself, hearing Duo's involuntary exhalation. Then Duo's mouth was open, and his head was tilting, inviting.
Trowa followed, not needing the future or insight or clairvoyance or listening or whispers to know he only needed to follow his body's innate knowledge. He deepened the kiss, letting his hand move from Duo's chin to press his palm against Duo's cheek. Duo's jaw moved under his touch, the arc of tongue and lip and mouth as old as time, stretching into the past and future, a thread Duo had never known and never followed. When the kiss faded of its own accord, Trowa pulled back to see Duo staring at his mouth. Duo licked his own lips, and Trowa was tempted to try for another kiss, but first he waited, hearing only the pounding of his heart in his ears.
"Why... " Duo swallowed, his adam's apple bobbing as he swallowed a second time. "Why... "
"We'll live through this," Trowa promised. "And then... when we have... I'll see to it personally that you won't be a virgin anymore."
"You'll hire a---" Duo's eyes went wide, and his next word was almost a squeak. "Personally?"
Trowa nodded, unable to mask the shyness.
"Tro," Duo breathed. His eyes dropped down to Trowa's lips again, and Trowa realized Duo's hands were clutching his shirt, tightly. Duo chewed on his lower lip for a second, and glanced up at Trowa through his eyelashes. "Uh... please. I want that."
"I'm glad," Trowa said, exhaling slowly. "Now you have incentive."
"Yeah." Duo blinked. His shoulders slumped, and he laughed, nervously. "I... I can't believe I just agreed to have sex with you."
"I'd rather your first time be with someone who cares about you," Trowa told him, perfectly serious. "I can't promise earth shattering, but I do know that makes a difference."
"How? How do you know?"
"I read a lot of books," Trowa answered. He couldn't duck fast enough to avoid the mock-annoyed swat, and he laughed.
Doro closed the email window with a sigh. "They're still at it, in Bremen," she announced. "Ten hours now, and it's up to about three hundred injured. No deaths reported, but it's only a matter of time. Six city blocks already in flames. Tear gas, riot squads, rubber bullets... "
Lena got off the workbench of the airplane hangar, and moved to stand behind Doro, massaging her shoulders with just the right amount of pressure. Doro gasped at the touch, tensing, then slowly relaxing as Lena continued to work.
"I don't know, Lena," Doro admitted, something in her voice sounding just a little broken to Lena. "I don't know... all those people, willing to show up and go through all that, just to keep attention off what we're doing here... "
"They're doing it for the same reasons as we," Lena replied. She shook her head, and moved her thumbs to press against the back of Doro's head, on either side of the spine. Prodding cautiously, she moved her thumbs in little circles, feeling the knots gradually release. "They don't want this world anymore than we do."
Doro laughed, a bitter sound. "I look back at the last forty-eight hours, and sometimes I wonder if I should've taken us all to another world, instead of bringing someone here. What have we done, but fucked up their lives, and ours?"
"Dorothy," Lena chastised, knowing whose lives Doro meant. "Do you even know what their lives were like?"
"Yeah." Doro closed the laptop, crossing her arms over it and laying her head down. "Duo told me. But it was still *their* world. And this is our world, and I don't like it. I don't want to keep doing this... " Doro shook off Lena's hands, and turned around in the chair. Her gray eyes were dry, but large, giving her a strangely innocent look despite the lines on her face of exhaustion and age. "Lena... when this is done, whether we get Cat and Hil back, or not... I'm quitting."
Lena sank to her knees. "Doro, you can't---"
"You've got Quatre now. One fuck-up with ZERO... " Doro shrugged. "I don't care. Ignore that, and he's still clearly more qualified than me. He's... " She paused, frowning, her gaze inward, before she looked at Lena again. "He's ruthless. And maybe I was, once, but now I'm just tired. I can't do it anymore. Everything that was ever important to me, I'm losing... or I've already lost. All I have left are you four, and if anything happens to any of you... "
"I know," Lena said, opening her arms to hug her oldest friend. "Just a little bit longer, I promise... "
"How much longer," Doro said, her face pressed against Lena's shoulder. Her hands tightened on Lena's shirt, as she struggled to keep her composure. "I need to know. I need something to look forward to, I need a reason, I need---"
"Seventy-two hours," Lena said, picking an arbitrary length of time. "Give us seventy-two more hours, and then we'll cut your hair and give you colored lenses and a new persona and pack you off to Australia or Tahiti or Canada... wherever you want to go. You can disappear."
"Disappear," Doro repeated, softly. "Seventy-two hours... "
"Just a little longer," Lena whispered, and hugged Doro tighter.
The sun had been down for several hours, and the city lights spread out at Heero's feet like a bed of stars, glowing golden in the summer blue. He knew he was too far from Wufei and Quatre to pick up even traces of their voices, but he longed for something familiar. In Lena's absence, Luce had taken over keeping an eye on him, but he'd slipped away after dinner, coming to the building's rooftop.
The Hague is just over two miles away as a crow would fly, Heero thought, remembering Trowa's phrase. He sighed, and shoved his hands in his pockets, hating the radio silence that kept him from any contact with Lena, at the very least. She and Doro were waiting at the airport with Sandrock and Talon. According to Une's plans, Shenlong, Sandrock, and Nataku were already sequestered in a chicken truck, and would trundle into the heart of the city market when dawn came. Zhiyi was the messenger, and her knock on the shop's door would signal the beginning of the mission. Wing was sitting in a parking garage only a few blocks from the apartment, surrounded by trucks carrying mechanical equipment. It felt odd to Heero, that he was uncertain about a mission without Wing, when he'd been doing such for almost ten years. It had felt so right, so *perfect*, to sit at the controls again, and let his hands move across the throttle, his body knowing what to do as though he were fifteen again and training with Dr. J...
Not this mission, Heero told the absent Wing silently, but maybe next time. He smiled to himself. Duo talked to Deathscythe during the war, he recalled. Or, he added, what little of the war we saw. He wondered if Duo were talking to 'Scythe, now. He wondered where Trowa was buried, and if he'd ever get to see the place, to ask forgiveness, and say goodbye.
Softly, Heero began to sing. It was one of their oldest mission songs, one Trowa had composed for Duo, many years ago. The two had argued about some issue no one could or would remember years later, but Trowa had apologized through poetry, as they sometimes did. It was Quatre who put it to music, but Heero was the first to sing it on a mission. Heero knew he couldn't match Trowa's even tenor. Heero's voice teetered between baritone and tenor without the honey tones of Trowa's voice, or the dark grandeur of Duo's baritone. A slight transposition in the melody, downwards from the tenor range, though, and he could manage it.
"You say that on the other side of darkness, there is morning... " He paused, trying to remember the words. His voice was carried away by the wind coming from the river. "You say that out of brokenness and pain, you will find joy... you say that giving everything for love means you've lost nothing... that the sacrifice is worth the price you pay... "
Heero choked, and put his hands out, blindly grasping the railing around the building's widow walk. "You say... " He stopped, swallowed hard, and kept singing, his hands white-knuckled on the railing. " ...That you want me... I can't believe it works that way, and I wonder why... I don't trust you... "
"That's beautiful," someone whispered, and Heero jumped, twisting, one hand still on the railing. Sally stepped out of the shadows. "What song is that?"
"Trowa wrote it," Heero answered, automatically. He turned away from her, hoping she'd get the message. She came closer, and he tensed, annoyed that she didn't just *understand*. He wondered if Lena would have understood, and just as quickly knew - with a stab in his heart as though he were betraying something precious - that she wouldn't have understood, either. There were only two people who would.
"Sounds like a dirge," Sally said, coming to stand alongside him. She didn't watch him, but put up a hand to push the coppery hair from her face, and it masked her face from him. "The city is a beautiful place, tonight. Peaceful." She glanced up, at the crescent moon, and the purplish-black sky. "Few stars, and a ring around the moon. Tomorrow will likely be rainy."
Heero grunted, unwilling to encourage the conversation more.
"Does it end there?"
"Hunh?" Heero realized several minutes had passed, and he looked over to see Sally's eyes fixed on his, a thoughtful expression on her face. She was, he realized, her height, and it almost made him smile to see the contrast. He was the shortest on his own team. Tomorrow would be the first mission he'd ever undertaken with two people at his side that were his height or shorter. He shook himself; aware Sally was still waiting. "No, there's more."
"Oh." She returned her gaze to the city below them.
On impulse, Heero clicked off the mute on the 'com, as though signaling the beginning of the mission. He knew there wouldn't be an answer, even from Quatre or Wufei, too far out of range. But it felt, suddenly, like the right thing to do. Lifting his head, he closed his eyes and began the next verse of the song.
"But I lost my grip on faith and reason, never did have any hope... ," and the song modulated into a minor chord, slowing with the verse's final lines. "Sometimes it seems like every part of me is torn and twisted, empty, dark... "
He let his voice drift away, taking a deep breath. The city was gone, hidden behind the blackness of his eyelids, and even Sally's presence was faint. Everything faded as he reached out, strengthening his voice a little, pitching it above the wind.
"I wonder what it's like to be the one who has the answers... I wonder what it means to know that somehow it's all right... I wonder if I'll ever find a way to see the light, to be the one who finally sees... I want to be... "
*I want to be a seer.*
Heero didn't sing the last line; they never had. They ended the song before then, not wanting to remind Duo of the fact that they all, in their own ways, both envied and pitied Duo's ability to see. It had its uses, but it tormented Duo more often than not. Heero was often bothered by the lightness of his existence, the sensation that everything would simply float away if he didn't exert effort to pin it all in place. And Trowa's echoes and whispers haunted his every thought, leaving Heero's team mate often puzzled over which thoughts were his and which were filtered in from people around him. Heero doubted the world's solidity, but Duo and Trowa doubted their own authenticity.
And for all that, all the drawbacks, Heero thought, I'd still give anything to have them here. I want to know what will happen, and I want to know what others are thinking and not saying. A mission without that knowledge feels like a failure before it's begun. He shook his head mentally, knowing that was only the superficial reason. I wish, he told himself bitterly, I wish I'd tried harder to let them both know that their talents were not the reason I relied on them. He leaned forward, opening his eyes to slits, letting the golden glow of the streetlamps below run scattershot, sliced by the lines of his eyelashes.
I wish I'd tried harder to tell them that all that really mattered to me... wasn't what they contributed to the team, but who they were.
"Come on inside," Sally whispered. "It's starting to rain."
Heero felt the drops running down his cheeks, and nodded. "Right," he said.
"I wonder what it's like to be the one who has the answers... I wonder what it means to know that somehow it's all right... "
Duo frowned and rolled over in his sleep, reaching for the song even as the dream faded. There was a coughing sound, followed by a solid thump, and then a click. He came instantly awake; the room was lit with the first rays of dawn. The other bed was empty, and something acrid tickled at Duo's nose. Keeping his mouth shut, he ignored the tightening in his chest as his body fought to make him open his mouth and breathe. Trowa was lying on the floor between the beds, shaking as he choked from the gas filling the room. A man was standing over Trowa, wearing a gas mask. His arm was outstretched, a gun pointed at Trowa's head.
Threads moved around the man and stilled, coming to a single point. Duo's vision swam from lack of oxygen. His inner sight was perfectly clear, and he knew the moment had come. He had no gun, and no knife... but I still have my life, he told himself. I'm not going to die a virgin. In the single heartbeat between waking and seeing, he laughed at his dreams.
There was no doubt in Duo's mind he was seeing the second before Trowa's death.
End Part 15
*tossing out disclaimer while running away from Zania* ... I don't own
Gundam
Wing, in case this wasn't obvious. No malicious infringement intended.
Many
thanks to those reading and writing me offline
Also, the
lyrics Heero sings are by Kagemihari, the Official Tetractys Lyricist.
This
particular song is called Seer, and the entire song can be found at
http://kagemihari.tripod.com/seer.htm. :D
(:./sol/tetra15)
